100 Years of Le Creuset: Elizabeth David's Shin of Beef Stewed in Red Wine
This week, we raised our wooden spoons in celebration—100 glorious years of Le Creuset! Our lunchtime demonstration was a feast for the senses, brimming with inspiration, irresistible tasters, and more than a few “I didn’t know you could do that!” revelations.
The session was a delightful blend of contemporary flair and time-honoured tradition, including recipes dating back to the days when Elizabeth David first introduced Le Creuset to British kitchens with her pioneering Cooking with Le Creuset cookbook.
Among the standouts was a richly comforting Beef Shin in Red Wine—a dish that’s as timeless as the cookware itself. If you missed the event, fear not: the recipe is below, ready for you to recreate a little culinary history at home.
Serves 6
Ingredients:
- 2 ½ lb approximately of shin of beef cut from the bone in length-way pieces and with skin and excess fat removed
- 4oz of fat salt pork or bacon (bought in the piece)
- A tablespoon or so of olive oil
- 1 large onion
- A clove of garlic
- A sprig or two of thyme
- A bayleaf
- Seasonings
- 2 tablespoons of flour
- One large glass (6 to 8oz) of ordinary red wine and an equal quantity of water or meat stock
Method
Cut the salt pork or bacon into cubes. (If using salt pork leave on the rind, if bacon discard it)
Put them into a 3 pint oval or round casserole or cocotte with the olive oil, set over a gentle heat. When the fat starts to run, add the onion, skinned and sliced. Let it gently take colour.
Season the pieces of meat and sprinkle them with the flour. Put them into the pot. Move them around so that they are well mixed with the onion and pork/bacon.
Heat the wine in a saucepan. Pour it bubbling over the meat. Let it boil fiercely for a few seconds. Now add the water or stock, and in the centre of the meat put the clove of garlic peeled, and crushed with the point of a knife, and the thyme and bayleaf tied together with a thread. If you have only powdered herbs it is preferable to tie them up in a little twist of muslin which, like the bunch of herbs on the stalk, can be removed when the dish is cooked. (The little muslin is not strictly necessary, but many people do not care for the little bits of dried herbs floating about in the finished stew)
Now cover your pot and transfer it to a very low oven, Gas No. 1, 290 deg F (140 deg C) and let it cook for about 3 hours, Or you can, if it happens to be more convenient, cook it for 1 to 1 ½ hours one day and finish the next. It will be quite safe in it’s enamel-lined pot (To leave food only half-cooked is a dubious practice, and I would never recommend it, but in dishes of this kind, the meat is in fact cooked through in quite a short time; the lengthy, almost imperceptible simmering is needed to make the meat tender and to give all the flavours time to amalgamate with the wine sauce).
Immediately before serving, the stew can be put on top of the stove and the sauce allowed to bubble and reduce a little.
Serve with potato puree, rice or boiled noodles.
An alternative method for the stew, is to use, instead of wine and stock or water, a couple of tablespoons each of port and mushroom ketchup and half a pint of stout. Instead of the pork, or as well, the stew can be enriched by the addition of a half-pound of ox kidney cut into small pieces as for a steak and kidney pudding.